Kawasaki’s Tom Sykes was out-paced by Ducati’s Davide Giugliano in the second World Superbike free practice session at Misano this afternoon. Huddersfield’s finest was in contention for a provisional pole position, but the local lad went one tenth quicker than the reigning champ’s best lap of 1’36.497.
Giugliano left it till the chequered flag appeared to make an impact and a 1’36.370 cemented his position at the top of the timesheets. His fellow compatriot, Aprilia’s Marco Melandri completed the top three.
In the beginning it was Aprilia's Sylvain Guintoli, who was not hanging around and was the first rider to shove Melandri from the top of the timing screens. He pipped his team-mate by one tenth with 35 minutes of track time remaining with a 1’36.860.
Sykes was slowly making his way up the timing-screens and a 1’37.155 after 30 minutes placed his Kawasaki third, demoting Davies to fourth in the process. But further up the table Melandri was not letting his team-mate get the better of him, especially at his home circuit, and a 1’36.550 was enough to re-gain his place on provisional pole, with 20 minutes left on track.
With 12 minutes remaining the red flags came out because of oil on the circuit, caused by an engine blow out to Michael Savary’s bike. Then just as the bikes made there way back out, there was another red flag – this time caused by American Aaron Yates, and the bikes quickly made their way back into the garages for the second time this afternoon.
But the bikes did venture back out again, and Ducati’s Davide Giugliano put in a solid 1’36.609 to go second. The Italian left it quite late to make an impact on the top three, but he appeared to want to repeat the success of his fellow countryman, Melandri and edge ever further up the timesheets, with five minutes remaining.
But Davies was holding firm to third place, even when his team-mate went ahead of him on the timing screens, but that was not to last as Sykes put down a 1’36.497 to pulverise the rest of the field and but an end to Melandri’s dominance at the top of the timesheets, after 40 minutes. But the Welshman finished the day fourth quickest, just ahead of Kawasaki’s Loris Baz.
Voltcom Suzuki’s Alex Lowes once again used his previous track knowledge, from his Stock 600 and 1000 days to get the better of the rest of the British pack. The Lincolnshire rider clocked a 1’36.698 to go seventh on the timesheets, with Guintoli sandwiched between Lowes and Pata Honda’s Jonathan Rea. The Northern Irishman’s best lap of 1’37.024 meant he finished comfortably inside the top ten, followed by Voltcom Suzuki’s Eugene Laverty in ninth.
Pata Honda’s Leon Haslam once again ended the free practice session in eleventh, after narrowly improving on his time from the morning to lap a 1’37.352. Leon Camier was no longer required as a stand-in rider for the BMW Italia team as Sylvain Barrier was declared fit enough to jump on his Evo bike today.
The rider who was injured in a road traffic collision a few months ago finished the outing 20th overall. Alstare’s Christian Iddon ended the afternoon 21st on his Bimota BB2 Evo machine, after a 1’39.214.
